1904 Mercedes-Simplex 28-32HP
At $7,500 when new (enough to buy eight Cadillacs or three Packards at the time), the Mercedes-Simplex 28-32HP occupied a category entirely its own.
Kaiser Wilhelm II expressed personal admiration for the car at Berlin’s 1903 automobile exhibition, and across the Atlantic its ownership register read like the Social Register (Vanderbilts, Guggenheims, Fricks, Astors).
The Simplex line was the work of Wilhelm Maybach, who understood that weight was the enemy of performance and designed cars that, despite their enormous engines, were relatively light for the time.
Power came from a 5,315 cc T-head four-cylinder fed by a single carburetor, producing 32 horsepower at 1,200 rpm and driving the rear wheels through twin side chains.
A four-speed transmission was mounted amidships and drove a countershaft, which in turn powered the double rear chain drive.
The name “Simplex” acknowledged genuine improvements over the original 1901 Mercedes (principally reduced engine weight and improved cooling). After 1905 the Simplex designation was dropped, and subsequent models carried revised horsepower designations rather than the Simplex name.
Of the approximately 1,500 Mercedes-Simplex automobiles produced, only a small number of pre-1905 Mercedes of all types are known to survive today, with just a handful of the larger-displacement variants accounted for.
Source
